Chapter 171: Chapter 128: "I don’t believe it.
"Do you... believe me?"
Zhou Bashi’s smile was sinister. His eyes were fixed, unblinking, on the hand that was inches away from him.
No one knew that Zhou Bashi’s back was already soaked with a cold sweat.
"Feng Bei means no offense..."
Feng Bei let out a soft breath, her tone indifferent as she spoke politely.
In that instant, a gentle breeze lifted the long hair covering Feng Bei’s right eye, revealing the sparkling eye hidden behind it.
Deep within her pupil, beyond the two characters "Ding Wei," a tall figure seemed to be hidden.
Feng Bei said with an air of casual indifference, "But you’re spouting nonsense. I don’t believe you."
Her paused figure transformed back into a black flash of lightning. Feng Bei took a step forward, her five pale fingers gently closing around Zhou Bashi’s stunned head.
...
Upper Three, Mystic, Feng Bei.
She was the only one in Ye Weiyang... no, in the entire Miracle Master circle, who was widely known as a Mystic who didn’t need to fear rules or Restrictions.
Even among Mystics, Feng Bei was an anomaly.
In other words, she was an anomaly among anomalies.
A freak.
A monster.
If one had to point out a Restriction for Feng Bei, it would be her inability to touch others.
It was like saying a deadly weapon is "too vicious, killing at the slightest taste of blood." In a sense, that could hardly be called a restriction.
This curse-like Omen was the source of Feng Bei’s terrifying reputation.
To this day, no one who had directly faced Feng Bei’s "Omen" had survived.
’I, Zhou Bashi, will be the first! The first person to survive Feng Bei’s Omen!’
Zhou Bashi had once been a street hustler.
He had swindled people on the streets, trafficked children, and set up scams to amass wealth. He would do anything for money, stopping at no deception.
His two missing fingers had been chopped clean off after a scam was exposed.
He later became a Night Guard.
He never would have dreamed that he would actually succeed.
The street hustler no longer had to worry about his next meal; he was now living on the official payroll.
What surprised Zhou Bashi even more was that just a few months ago, the Night Lord had promoted him against all precedent to the position of "Lower Six." This position had been vacant for over a year, and all the Constellations had been eyeing it covetously for a long time.
After becoming Lower Six, Zhou Bashi collected a handsome salary but was only ever assigned trivial cases. He was never dispatched for any major paranormal incidents.
This suited Zhou Bashi just fine. He happily indulged in feasting, drinking, and womanizing, carefree and content as he drifted through the mortal world.
Until twenty days ago, when a secret order from the Night Lord shattered his peaceful and prosperous life.
He needed to go to Shuzhou.
At a specific time, in a specific place, to deceive a specific person.
That person’s name was Feng Bei.
He called his Miracle Technique "It’s Real if You Believe."
The hearts from the first two times had been prepared in advance, and the two people collapsing involved some Cunning and Deceitful tricks. Zhou Bashi’s real goal was the opening of the third box.
Every Thousand Gate General was a master of psychological games. Before setting out, Zhou Bashi had done his homework, thoroughly analyzing Feng Bei’s psychology from case files and records.
According to reliable intelligence, he was sixty percent confident that Feng Bei’s current weak spot was the handsome and powerful man named Zheng Shan.
’Hmph... women.’ Zhou Bashi was absolutely certain of this.
From the moment he began his Casting, Zhou Bashi never thought he could completely deceive Feng Bei.
All he needed was a fleeting moment of "doubt" from Feng Bei. As long as she saw the object in the box and "doubted" for just an instant, Zhou Bashi, who walked the Path of the Thousand Gate General, could unleash his true finishing move: "Belief Makes It Real."
Zhou Bashi knew he was taking a gamble.
A Thousand Gate General was both a conman and a gambler. He believed that if he could successfully deceive "Mystic Feng Bei" this one time, he would be able to fully push open the tightly shut door within his dark Path.
Zhou Bashi longed to know what mysteries lay hidden behind that door.
The moment Feng Bei’s hand touched Zhou Bashi’s head,
Zhou Bashi suddenly felt the sounds, sights, air currents, and smells around him come to an abrupt halt.
It was as if his five senses had been stripped away by that ominous hand.
No one knew what it felt like to be taken by Feng Bei’s Omen. At least, no one had ever lived to describe the feeling.
"I lost..."
WHOOSH.
Zhou Bashi’s vision went black. He plunged into an endless darkness, bubbles escaping his lips. He had arrived in his Path.
A sliver of enchanting light spilled from the closed door. Stunned, Zhou Bashi’s body drifted forward involuntarily.
He pushed the door open.
Little by little, sliver by sliver, inch by inch, the door opened.
Clusters of crimson flowers, red as blood, spread out from behind the door, accompanied by dreamlike shadows as dark as ink.
CRACK!
A tall, humanoid monster composed of writhing, putrid flesh suddenly squeezed through the doorway. Its gruesome head, formed from the same squirming meat, opened its mouth. Spinning, sharp teeth enlarged a hundredfold, biting down on the screaming Zhou Bashi, grinding him to pieces and swallowing him without a trace.
In an instant, Zhou Bashi was devoured completely.
The humanoid monster let out a satisfied belch and retreated behind the door.
In its hand, a massive, twisted Horse-Cutting Saber grew from the end of its writhing, rotten flesh.
...
「General Town.」
Within Jun Buxiao’s "Shadow Puppetry."
"I lost..."
"So beautiful..."
Xu Shu watched helplessly as Feng Bei slapped her hand down, gripping Zhou Bashi’s head.
Zhou Bashi’s eyes instantly lost focus. He uttered only two sentences.
In a flash, Zhou Bashi’s body, starting from his head, was seemingly torn apart by an invisible meat grinder, turning into neat chunks.
A living person—flesh, blood, and bone—had been reduced to a pile of pieces with a SPLAT in the blink of an eye. The sight was enough to make anyone’s soul leave their body, striking terror into their very core.
The scene fell deathly silent.
Even breathing seemed to stop.
This wasn’t the first time Dou Xie had witnessed Feng Bei kill.
To kill someone so casually, so completely... no matter how many times one saw it, it would deliver a spiritual shock to anyone.
"Blechhh—"
Dou Xie’s face turned green again as he knelt on the ground, dry heaving.
Feng Bei’s long hair fell, once again covering her right eye. She looked up at Xu Shu on the roof and smiled faintly.
"You’re next."
...
Zheng Xiu emerged from the dungeon, his face as grim as still water.
That night, snow fell over the Imperial City.
Layers of white frost coated the rooftops and walls, sparkling and translucent.
Moonlight spilled down, draping the vast Zheng Family estate in a silvery-white veil.
Zheng Xiu didn’t alert anyone, not even Second Lady. After leaving the dungeon, he whistled a few notes into the air.
From the second basement level of the dungeon, in the Eternal Purgatory, faint screams could be heard. There was no telling who the unlucky soul dragged into the "Eternal Purgatory" was tonight.
Zheng Xiu paid it no mind. After whistling, he waited in the courtyard.
Figure after figure of the night watch appeared like phantoms, hazy and indistinct.
They surrounded Zheng Xiu, quietly awaiting his next command.
"Thank you for your hard work."
Zheng Xiu nodded to the shadows.
A few of the silhouettes projected on the wall scratched their heads shyly. They let out a few low whistles, signaling that the Master needn’t be so formal. They were just doing the job they were paid for. Getting a salary while also practicing their Path was killing several birds with one stone; they would be happy to take on more jobs like this.
Soon, Qing Shisan arrived, fashionably late. He didn’t usually live here, only coming when called.
"Hong’ou’s man is gravely ill and on his deathbed, so he can’t get away. That brute with the surname Pei is up in the middle of the night, full of vigor and busy plowing someone, so he can’t get away either..."
When Qing Shisan appeared, he had a playful, flippant grin, explaining with a yawn while smoking. But when he saw the grave expression on Zheng Xiu’s face, the jokes he was about to make died in his throat. As a veteran rogue from the Rogue Realm, Qing Shisan’s skill at Reading the Room was at a Master level. One look at Zheng Xiu’s face told him something was wrong.
"Something happened?"
One second Qing Shisan was acting the fool, the next his gaze turned sharp. Smoke curled around him as he lowered his voice and asked the question.
Zheng Xiu nodded.
He didn’t tell Qing Shisan about the incident that had occurred in Shuzhou, a thousand miles away.
"From this moment on, lock down the Zheng Family estate. Don’t let a single member of Ye Weiyang cross our threshold. Don’t let a single Raven fly over the Zheng Family grounds."
Qing Shisan’s expression changed. "Including... Mystic Feng Bei?"
Zheng Xiu shook his head. "Not including her."
Qing Shisan breathed a sigh of relief.
In all of Ye Weiyang, there wasn’t a soul Qing Shisan was afraid of, except for Feng Bei.
For a moment there, he had worried that the Master’s secret escapades with the fourth concubine had been exposed.
’Wait, what does the Master sleeping with a concubine have to do with Feng Bei?’
"What if a Raven flies over?"
Qing Shisan pointed to the sky.
"Shoot it down."
Qing Shisan narrowed his eyes. After a moment of silence, he didn’t ask any more questions. Instead, he broke into a grin and blew a few strange smoke rings. "Got it!"
After giving his orders, Zheng Xiu turned and walked toward his room.
Finally, Zheng Xiu remembered one more thing.
"If, and I’m just saying if, I fall into a deep sleep for the next few days and don’t wake up, just ignore me. Focus on guarding the estate."
Qing Shisan quickly agreed.
After Master Zheng hurried back to his cell,
Qing Shisan sat on the steps, smoking in silence and watching the late-night snow. He was motionless, like a guardian deity at a temple gate.
"Ah, my old friends, it looks like you’ve started making trouble."
He recalled Xu Shu’s recent visit and faintly sensed something was afoot.
Only a helpless sigh remained in the night.
"Yesterday, I left the Jianghu and swore I’d never return. Today, I look back and realize I never even got out."
"Sigh... None of us can ever truly be free."
